Dramatised by George Poles.


A satire that marries science fiction with political comment. The newts are discovered living in the ocean, are exploited by the human race but then rebel, threatening the future of Earth.

When humanity encounters another race of intelligent bipeds sharing the Earth, what choice is there but to exploit it? When the existence of a group of speaking newts comes to the attention of the ruthless GH Bondy and his Salamander Syndicate, they find themselves turned into a commodity as the nations fight over them. At its heart, this joyously funny satire is a plea for decency and tolerance towards others, as relevant now as when it was first written in the 1930s.


CAST:
Capek ...... Dermot Crowley

Olga ...... Sally Hawkins

Van Toch ...... Henry Goodman

Povondra ...... Geoffrey Beevers

Mrs Povondra ...... Tina Gray

GH Bondy ...... Adrian Scarborough

Ensemble ...... Ben Crowe; Martin Hyder; Geoff McGivern



Howard Davidson (composer)

Elizabeth Freestone (director)

War with The Newts
Sunday 1 April 2007 20:00-21:30 (Radio 3)

Man discovers a species of giant, intelligent newts and learns to exploit them so successfully that the newts gain skills and arms enough to challenge man's place at the top of the animal kingdom. Along the way, Karel Capek satirizes science, runaway capitalism, fascism, journalism, militarism, even Hollywood.

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